Identification:The Africanized Honey Bee is a hybrid of one of the several European
Honey Bee subspecies (Apis mellifera mellifera, A.m.carnica, A.m.caucasia,
or A.m.linguica) and the African Honey Bee (Apis mellifera scutellata).

The Africanized Honey Bee, more popularly known as the "killer" bee,
has the general appearance of the more temperamental European Honey Bee
(Apis mellifera). However, they are slightly smaller, but only microscopic
measurements in a laboratory would be able to distinguish between the two.
They are robust, 3/4 of an inch in length, and are covered in fuzz. They
are brownish in color with black stripes that aren't as distinct as those
on wasps or hornets. They have four clear wings that are attached to the
thorax, which is the middle section of the body. The six legs are also
attached to the bottom of the thorax. The abdomen is larger than the thorax
and ends in the stinger, and the head is smaller than both of the sections.
The two compound eyes are large and bulbous and allow the Africanized Honey
Bee to see ultraviolet rays, enabling them to fly at night. The queens
are the largest bees in the social structure, followed by the drones and
then the workers.

Africanized Honey Bees and European Honey Bees may be similar in appearance,
but not in behavior. Africanized Honey Bees will attack when unprovoked,
and they respond rapidly and in large numbers to disturbances that European
Honey Bees would ignore. Like European Honey Bees, Africanized Honey Bees
can sting only once; they deliver a venom identical to that of European
Honey Bees. Both types of bee die shortly after leaving their stings and
ends of their abdomen in their victim.

Original
Distribution:The ancestors of the Africanized
Honey Bee live throughout Europe and Africa, south of the Sahara Desert.

Current Distribution:The Africanized Honey Bee
has spread over South and Central America through Mexico and into the United
States. Africanized Honey Bees continue the northward expansion of their
territories by swarming, the process by which bee colonies replicate. The
spread rate has been about 200 miles a year.

Site
and Date of Introduction:Africanized Honey Bees have
gradually spread northward through South America, Central America, and
eastern Mexico, progressing some 200 miles per year. In 1990, Africanized
Honey Bees reached southern Texas, appeared in Arizona in 1993, and found
their way to California in 1995.

Migration of Africanized
Honey Bees(http://biology.usgs.gov/)

Mode(s) of
Introduction:Honey bees are not native
to the Western Hemisphere. European settlers brought most honey bees to
the Americas approximately 400 years ago. However, European Honey Bees
did not perform well in the tropical climate of South America. African
Honey Bees were brought to the Western hemisphere in 1956, when the Brazilian
government asked Dr. Warwick Kerr, a geneticist, to create a bee that could
survive Brazil's tropical climate. The European Honey Bee had not been
able to successfully withstand heat and predation. It was hoped that African
Honey Bees, having proved themselves successful for millions of years in
the tropics, could bred with the European bee. The goal was to create a
bee which was gentle, yet successful in the tropics. However, in 1957,
some of them got loose and set up housekeeping in the tropics of Brazil.
They've been spreading ever since.

Reason(s)
Why it has Become Established:Africanized colonies can
increase their colony populations extremely quickly, but only in response
to immediate availability of resources. The rapid expansion is obtained
by high fecundity and shorter development times. These characteristics
indicate that Africanized honeybees have evolved to survive and thrive
in unpredictable conditions.

Because rainfall determines
the availability and abundance of flora and food sources, the unpredictable
rainfall in the tropics creates unpredictable availability of resources
for bees. Therefore, Africanized bees' foraging stresses this unreliability
and results in a more opportunistic bee. The bees forage, store their resources,
and increase their chances of survival by collecting more pollen, committing
more of their foraging cohort to pollen collecting, and swarming more often
to areas of higher resources. Africanized bees might forage individually,
shift their foraging from intensive and collective to gleaning, or searching
of relevant resources individually, bit by bit.

Because of this adaptability
to unpredictable resources, the Africanized honeybee is categorized as
an r-selected species. This means that they discover their habitat quickly,
disperse readily to find other habitats if and/or when their current habitat
has become inhabitable, use resources quickly and efficiently, and reproduce
rapidly.

Many other basic
Africanized Honey Bees traits include:

frequent
swarming to establish new nests

minimal
hoarding of honey

the
ability to survive on sparse supplies of pollen and nectar

moving
their entire colony readily (abscond) if food is scarce

exploiting
new habitats very quickly and is not particular about its nesting site.

a
highly defensive nature

responding
more quickly and more bees sting

sensing
a threat from people or animals 50 feet or more from their nest

sensing
vibrations from power equipment 100 feet or more from nest

pursuing
a perceived enemy 1/4 mile or more

Ecological
Role:Competition among nectar-
and pollen-feeding invertebrate pollinators and resource partitioning are
affected by introduced Africanized Honey Bees. When Africanized Honey Bees
compete with other species of honey bees for flowers, the Africanized bees
may displace the other bees from the food sources. While over a short period
of time, the abundance of other species of bee decreases and colony nectar
and pollen harvest decreases, Africanized honeybees are negatively affected
slightly over long periods. Competition is considered among one of the
factors that are responsible for differences in foraging behavior and specialization
in bees.

Africanized Honey Bees have
similar predators as all other bees. Their most destructive predators are
humans. Africanized honeybees are preyed on by ants, anteaters, and armadillos.
Honey badgers, safari ants, bee wolves, and bears are also major predators.
Additionally, predation causes disturbances that could affect swarming
and absconding. If a colony has just settled and predation causes a disturbance,
the colony might be forced to relocate immediately, affecting colony size
and growth rates. Bees defend their nests from predators by biting or stinging.
Africanized bees pursue their predatory intruders for much longer distances
than European honeybees.

Additionally, parasites such
as mites, fungi, and bacteria are supported by Africanized Honey Bees.
Although Africanized bees are subject to the same diseases and mites that
European bees are, Africanized bees have different biological processes
and behaviors that affect the importance and visibility of the diseases
and mites.

Benefit(s):Africanized honeybees in
the tropics directly influence 25-30% of the reproductive success of the
flora. The flora depends on the bees for pollination, and in turn, flora
provide seeds and fruit for their own reproductive success and as food
for other organisms.

There are two views about
the influences that Africanized Honey Bees have on crops. Pollination of
crops can continue even if an area has been fully colonized by Africanized
bees. The first argument contends that farmers' costs to produce crops
increases because of the required public protection from Africanized bees
and the increasing costs of purchasing European Honey Bees for pollination.
The other view argues that Africanized honeybees are better pollinators
than European honeybees because they emphasize brood rearing and colony
growth instead of honey production. The shift in resource management allows
Africanized honeybees to forage more for pollen than European bees. Therefore,
Africanized bees can be regarded as superior pollinators. In Sinaloa Mexico,
Africanized honeybees have invaded the area but have not caused any problems
in crop harvests and production.

Threat(s):Africanized Honey Bees are
dangerous because they attack intruders in numbers much greater than European
Honey Bees. Since their introduction into Brazil, they have killed some
1,000 humans, with victims receiving ten times as many stings than from
the European strain. They react to disturbances ten times faster than European
Honey Bees, and will chase a person a quarter of a mile.

Other concerns with Africanized
Honey Bees are the effects on the honey industry (with an annual value
of $140 million dollars) and general pollination of orchards and field
crops (with an annual value of $10 billion dollars). Interbred colonies
of European and Africanized honey bees may be more aggressive, excessively
abandon the nest, and not survive the winters. Further, beekeepers may
not continue their business of honey production if faced with aggressive
bees. The packaged bee and queen rearing industries are in the southern
United States, which would affect the honey industry across the continent.
Additionally, several researchers have shown that native solitary and social
bee species are outcompeted by the introduced Honey Bee. It is possible
that many species of native bees have or will go extinct as a consequence
of the ecological dominance of these introduced bees.

Control
Level Diagnosis:Diagnosing a control level
depends on the environmental conditions. As Africanized bees expand into
temperate areas, their tropical adaptations are less advantageous. Africanized
Honey Bee populations in temperate regions would not successfully establish
a domain and therefore, a "Minimal Priority" control level should be diagnosed.
However, a "Medium Priority" control level for North America's southern
semitropical area is recommended. For example, in Argentina, Africanized
bees dominate in the northern semitropical regions, but European bees dominate
in the southern temperate area; in-between, there are hybrid zones where
bees have varying degrees of African or European traits. A similar pattern
may occur in the United States, with African traits dominating in extreme
southern regions.

Control Method:Even though the ecological
range limits and economic consequences of the African Honey Bee migration
into the United States are not precisely known, specialists agree that
honey bees are economically important, and that sufficient biological information
exists to develop adequate inventory and monitoring programs. Added benefits
to honey bee monitoring programs are also important because bee colonies
can also serve as excellent indicators of flowering plant productivity,
ecosystem stability, and relative ecological health.

Because it will be more informed
about the African Honey Bee, the U.S. beekeeping industry is not expected
to suffer extensive damage from the invasion. It is anticipated that beekeepers
will attempt to maintain European stock by drone-flooding, which involves
maintaining large numbers of common European Honey Bees in areas where
commercially-reared queen bees mate. This process would limit the mating
possibilities between Africanized drones and European queens. Another strategy
is frequent re-queening, where the beekeeper replaces the queen of the
colony, thus assuring that the queens are European Honey Bees and that
mating has also occurred with European drones. In addition, beekeepers
will probably become involved in exterminating wild bee nests to protect
their managed bees from resource competition.

Finally,
the public should maintain a healthy respect for all bee colonies and swarms.
Any wild swarms found near residences or close to domestic animals (horses,
cows, poultry, hogs, and dogs) must be suspect and reported to pest control
operators, police, fire departments, and/or beekeepers. In all cases, the
people who received the multiple stings, survived. Since the bees are potentially
dangerous, people need to be aware that they are out there. The public
already is exposed to yellow jackets and small wasps that are just as defensive
as the Africanized Honey Bee’s. Therefore, killer bees are not so scary.
Just stay away from bee hives. The bees will "never go away" nor can they
be completely exterminated. Bees are responsible for the life of our trees,
flowers and the food we eat. At least one meal per person per day is possible
because of the bee. Therefore, learning about the Africanized Honey Bees
and taking certain precautions can lower the risk of being injured by this
new insect in our environment.